The Conference started on Tuesday, 6 December, with an introductory speech by Andy Isherwod, Vice-President for software (a rather loose translation of the otherwise quite complicated title). He was followed by a much more interesting Russ Daniels, HP Software Technical Director, who has managed to climb quite high up the hierarchy from a technical background without losing his long-hair "hacker" look.

The conference will last until Friday, and the participants will be able to choose from among 120 lectures and presentations, while hundreds of presenters expect them during breaks in the expo section of the event, all of them HP partners, eager to explain in detail the advantages of their latest solutions.